What I spent My Allowance On (New Stuff For The Bench)

[shropshire lad]

I don't know how you Brits can tell one bill from another, they all have the Queen's smiling face on them.  Our dead president's are different on each bill and you can tell them by the picture.   

Lawton

I am going to resist the temptation but sure Nick will be able to explain 

  Words of one syllable needed here don't you think , Gordon?


Right here we go .

   On English banknotes you have the picture of our wonderful Queen ( don't you agree , Gordon ? ! ? ) and on the other side we have pictures of other people . At the moment there is Elizabeth Fry on the £5 note , Charles Darwin on the £10 note , Adam Smith on the £20 note and ( Gordon will confirm this as I've never seen one ) on the £50 note there is Matthew Boulton and James Watt . Now if this isn't identification enough each note is a different colour , blue for £5 , brown for £10 , a sort of purpley for £20 and red for £50 . Now if this still isn't identification enough for you all the notes are of different sizes , starting with the £5 being the smallest up to the largest , yes you've guessed it , £50 note . This last feature is particularly useful to blind people so that they can identify the notes by touch . You see , one American president looks much the same as another if you can't see .You do have blind people in America , don't you ? Not much concession to them then  .  Common sense really .

  There is a good book by Lee Childs that uses as it's central theme the fact that all the American banknotes are the same size and the baddies found a way of bleaching the colour off $1 notes and reprinting them as $100 notes . I won't tell you how it ends .

  Clear enough for you , Lawton ?

  Nick

Anoher lesson in History.  I thought you only knew about bricks.

Jerry

  History ? This is the here and now .

   Well , now you know that I'm not the " One Brick Pony" that you took me for . Ha , ha , ha .

[lab-dad]

Something for the bench;



I use my chopper a lot and have never had a place for it.
Just look at the bench, I like most of you have several square feet of bench but only 6 square inches to actually "work"! 
Often I am chopping with it on my lap!
Now I have a dedicated location and when not in use I swing it out of the way (somewhat)
I placed the leg right under the blade.
The leg is temporary until I turn a proper one. The hinge pin is removable in case I want to move it.
I also put a pin in the center hole of the hinge to take any load off the hinge.

-Mj

[Malachi Constant]

Okay, now that we understand the swinging Chopper platform ... what's with the bucket full of table legs set in red clay or mud?  And how often will you bang the Chopper attachment into the open drawers on the cart and knock all the stuff off the top.      (Does it show that I'm used to creating little disasters in the workplace?) -- Dallas

[Mobilgas]

Ill take a shot at the bucket under Marty's bench      It's PVC tubes for holding strip wood and wire??

[lab-dad]

Ding ding ding!
We have a winner!
Yes, Craig - stripwood.
And they are stuck in a piece of plywood, with lots of holes.
The color is off due to taking the pic with my phone I guess.

As far as how often I bang and create a shitalance, your guess is as good as mine!
Plenty of room to open the drawers though.

-Mj

[marc_reusser]

Dude,....I am so calling OSHA. 

[lab-dad]

Just got the "chipping" edition of the AK
Weathering magazine!
Man is it thick!
Looks like another winner!
Mj

[turtle]

Well here's a quick post - and a few snatched pic's. Kind of looking for a bit of advice too, not the smart alecky kind, but some genuine honest advice.
You see - I've finally managed to purloin myself a Lathe, not a fancy all singing all dancing mega lathe but a rather old and a bit tatty "watchmakers" lathe. I love the size of it as it fits really well into my available space, doesn't have to go outside and will do most stuff I can imagine doing on it??
Done a bit of research online and it appears to be a "wartime or shortly thereafter" BTM "Geneva" style (don't actually know what that means) But it comes boxed with a fair assortment of accessories, most of which I don't understand or can't figure out how they work - it looks as though a few bits have gone walkabouts but most appears to be there?
There was a lot of other bits chucked in the box and .... well, you best have a look at the pic's and see what you think to my haul?

Here you go then .........


The "Haul".



The Box.


The basic Lathe on it's baseboard with motor.


Other assorted tools.


And a Dremel tool.

There is a great "mechanical coping saw" that I forgot to take a detailed pic of too - that looks pretty groovy.
Don't make me feel bad if this isn't the latest in tool fashion or it's not mega "the dogs dangleys" as I'm quite thrilled with my apparent recent good fortune - it pretty much is what I've been after for a long long time - and I don't think I was robbed either!

Would appreciate some positive opinions or advice on the usage of this kind of kit.

All the best ..........

Andi - Okay, a little slow to view this, but what you have there is some very expensive tooling especially if you were to 'try' and purchase individual items.
The lathe - used as per a standard lathe except collets are normally used rather than a chuck. For small scale brass and plastic I would definitely term that as "the bees knees".
I spent a few months sitting behind one similar during my intern time, the quickest and easiest way to get to know and learn is to just jump in - forget what all the books and taweb say, small scale machining is an art learned by doing. Those little machines can tolerate a fair bit of mistreatment (not recommended though  ).
I think you should post some shots of your 'achievements' on it 
Incidentally there are about +$600.00NZD (300Pound) just in the measuring gauges in the first photo.
Hope you are cranking it up regularly and making swarf  .

[Andi Little]

Thanks Roger ............

But posting a picture of my achievements is always going to be a problem, no matter how they're produced!

The lathe has become a rather cherished piece of kit - I really do enjoy fiddling around with it - and it gets used on a surprisingly regular basis. I am a little stymied by the fact that I don't have much in the way of material: so I'm tending to turn anything I need in styrene. Which I already knew - but soon had confirmed: is waaaay too soft, I might as well be trying to turn old chewing gum.

I need to get a hold of some acrylic rod, which has been described as sufficient for my needs (largely) and in truth after your revelations of the past few weeks I'm a bit loathe to post pictures of anything I've done!!!! 

Here's a pic' though of something I'm trying to make at the minute, and the best can be said is that I turned the portholes out of styrene sheet - and learnt how to work with those "stepped collets" while I was at it.





In my own defence this is going to be a derelict so the lack of finesse is to be excused - which is just as well!!!


Thanks for you interest ............. Andi.

[greenie]

Andi, before you lash out and waste your hard earned readies on some VERY SOFT acrylic rod, have you ever had a look in a scrap bin of a Plastic Sign Maker. They have off-cuts from different thickness acrylic sheets, these off-cuts normally end up in the scrap bin bound for the tip, the acrylic in the sheets is far harder than what is in the acrylic rods.
The sheet material turns up far superior to that of the soft rods, the stuff in the rods can and will melt onto the lathe tool, where-as the sheet material just turns like magic.
You really have to do something stupid to ruin the sheet acrylic material.
If you can find some place local, go and have a talk to the owner and explain why you are after the sheet acrylic, he may even hand over a bit of material that is 25 mm thick for FREE.
Try it ( the sheet acrylic ) before you decide to buy any rod acrylic.

Oh, I do a tad of dumpster diving after working hours, and the rewards are amazing.
To turn the sheet acrylic, say it's 10mm thick, then cut a piece however long you want by 10 mm wide in a band saw set-up for cutting timber, into the four jaw with this 10 mm square bit and use the live centre to steady this bit and into it with the tooling, soon you'll have a 10 mm rod of the REAL good stuff.

regards  greenie

Forgot to add that the acrylic can be glued to polystyrene real easy, ask what the Plastic Sign Maker uses for gluing his stuff with, or even use a tad of good ole super glue to attach whatever to whatever.

[finescalerr]

Greenie, did you realize you no longer exist -- at least as an icon? Your little icon space now shows a white rectangle telling us that the Photobucket image no longer exists.

Suggestion to everybody: DO NOT use links when posting images. If you go back and read older threads you will find hundreds of missing images, all linked to sites that removed them or shut down altogether. It is pretty frustrating when you want to refer to an old thread and find only the text!

Russ

[turtle]

Styrene is actually very easy to machine cleanly, the trick to it is a slower RPM speed plus slow feed speed plus very sharp cutting tooling with a steep chip-breaker angle - a blunt cutting tool with a shallow chip-breaker is the cause for heat build-up = ugly parts. With sharp cutters you can increase the drive speed but still use a slow feed speed.
Ain't no shame in what you've produced there, at least you are spending time at the bench  and enjoying the experience  .

[marc_reusser]

On acrylics, you want to look for cast material when machining......not extruded.  There is a large difference in working and finishing quality of the two.

[greenie]

Yes, cast acrylic is what/how the different thickness sheets are made.

Good stuff to work with, have a look at this 1/16th scale Detroit Diesel 6V-92T, all the bits of acrylic are machined from the sheet material.

regards  greenie

[Ray Dunakin]

Nice job on that engine. Got any pics of it painted?